Woodand Marine Corps League collecting Toys for Tots

The members of the Woodland's Marine Corps League Detachment 627 were scheduled to begin distributing toy barrels for the Toys for Tots Program this past Wednesday, continuing the tradition that is now 65 years old.

This year like those past, depends on the generosity of the community and local businesses to make the Toys For Tots program successful.

Organizer Ron La Sala said league members are working with the Yolo County Social Services Department to identify those children in need of toys for Christmas. Toys will be given out to eligible children on Saturday, Dec. 22, at the Yolo County Fairgrounds.

The gates will open at 6:30 a.m. on Gum Avenue, at the Yolo County Fairgrounds according to La Sala. Woodland police will not permit residents to line up on the street the night before the toy giveaway as they have in previous years. People will be asked to move along and vehicles will be towed if unattended. People scheduled to receive toys are advised to begin lining up the morning of distribution. No one, he said, eligible to receive a toy will be turned away.

Since 1947, the United States Marine Corps have collected and distributed toys to needy children in the United States, Puerto Rico and American Samoa. In 2011, the U.S. Marine Corps Toys For Tots program distributed 15.6 million new toys to 7.2 million underprivileged children across the country.

In total, today there are 721 community programs made up of Marines members of the Marine Corps League and members of local civilian organizations all working in support of the annual "Toys for Tots" campaigns.